Amazon Kindle for iPhone app review
I have a iPod Touch, and I love ebooks, but on iPod Touch, the choice of commecial ebooks is very limited. I almost bought the new Kindle 2, because it provides such a vast range of ebooks, but $359 was a lot of money in the current economic situation. Then, today, I heard that Kindle app for iPhone/iPod Touch app was released (AppStore). This free app is a software version of Kindle. You can buy Kindle books from Amazon, and they send the file wireless to your iPhone/iPod Touch. It means you do not need Kindle to read Kindle books!
I downloaded the app, and installed it. Then I started the app on my iPod Touch. It asked my Amazon id and password. I submitted them, and I was ready to use it. There was no ebooks inside Kindle yet, so I needed to download some from Amazon’s Kindle store.
There, you can download the first chapter of Kindle ebooks for free. They already knew that I am the proud owner of CimiPod Touch with Kindle app. How nice.
I chose The Art of Strategy by Avinash K. Dixit and Barry J. Nalebuff, then I clicked on Send sample now. When I opened Kindle app on my iPod Touch, it downloaded the sample via wifi. Very smooth. The ebook looked nice on the screen. There was option for font size, but not font itself. But since I liked the font, I didn’t care. One big disappointment was the fact that I could not read the ebook in horizontal mode. I always liked to read my ebooks on horizontal mode, since it helps you to read more natually (just like reading a real book). But, for some reason Amazon doesn’t allow user to chose which way they can read the ebook. Maybe they did not realize that iPhone/iPod Touch has much smaller screen than real Kindle, so they need horizontal reading.
Then I downloaded a sample chapter of Globalizing Capital by Barry Eichengreen. Now, this ebook was so badly formatted, that I could not believe it was published just last year. As you can see, the font looks like a relic from pre-modern pressing machine, and apparently this ebook was scanned and OCRed, rather than converted from the origianl file (see ‘internationaI’ with a capital I at the end in the second line? It looks different than the l’s in ‘will’ on the fourth line). You can see the huge gap between ‘macroeconomics’ and ‘and’ on the first line. That is why we need horizontal mode!
It was clear that I could not read Globalizing Capital on my iPod Touch, so I decided to buy The Art of Strategy instead. But, when I tried to buy it, Amazon rejected my order, saying, basically, you have to be in the US to buy the ebook. But, I was determined to buy them. I was so close enjoying Kindle ebooks, so I could not give up now. So, I used Bank Of America debit card that I got when I was in the US a few years ago.
To use American credit/debit card, you need to go to your account page, then click on Manage your Kindle, then edit Your default 1-Click payment method. Once you submit your credit card details, you can buy Kindle ebooks anywhere in the world!
If you do not have American credit card, do not despair. According to this blog post, you can still buy Kindle ebooks from outside of the US using Amazon gift card. I didn’t try this method, but I don’t see why it wouldn’t work, as long as Amazon does not change their policy.
Anyway, Kindle for iPhone is almost dream come true for me. Now I can buy thousands of books online without paying the international delivery fee or waiting for several weeks. And Kindle ebooks are usually much cheaper than the paper books, so I will save money on that account, too.
Between Audible and Kindle, my library is almost fully digital. Now that is a life of a book lover in the 21st century!
